Tag Archives: tortilla

One thing we eat a lot of around here in California is “Mexican” food. “Mexican” is a blanket term for anything involving tortillas, rice, beans, and avocados. This can be in the form of burritos, tacos, papusas, empanadas, enchiladas, or quesadillas. I’m not sure what can be classified as authentic around here. Then there is also the clash between the NorCal and SoCal burritos. I’m a NorCal burrito person myself because I’m not into the refried beans that are used in the SoCal burrito. Plus, NorCal burritos are monster sized and super cheap. They can last me two meals.

Last week we bought a large package of flour tortillas from Safeway and did a taco night. Taco night around our house pretty much consists of pinto beans, avocados, flour tortillas, chile verde, and cheese (for me). This time I made brown rice to go with it and Andrew sauteed some diced yellow onion. This was the first time that I succesfully made brown rice. It was great! This is a simple, easy meal. I wouldn’t say it’s quick because brown rice takes almost an hour to cook, but it definitely is easy.

Basic Brown Rice

1 cup brown rice

2 cups vegetable broth

1. Put brown rice and vegetable broth in a small saucepan. Then bring heat to high and boil.

2. Once the rice and broth are boiling, turn the heat to low and cover with a lid. Let it simmer for forty-five to fifty-five minutes.

3. Remove the lid and fluff the rice. I had excess liquid even though my rice was done cooking. I just drained this out into the sink.

I first encountered Israeli couscous (a.k.a. pearl couscous) my freshman year at UC Santa Cruz. It was used instead of bulghur in a tabouleh dish. I loved it! I’m not a fan of regular couscous, something about the texture bothers me, but I really love Israeli couscous. It has a great texture and cooks very quickly.

Israeli Couscous Salad

Ingredients

Trader Joe’s Israeli Couscous

low sodium vegetable broth

broccoli slaw (a mixture of broccoli stems and carrots)

9 chicken”less” strips (Trader Joe’s brand)

balsamic vinaigrette

salt

pepper

1 sun dried tomato and habañero tortilla (Trader Joe’s brand)

1. Put vegetable broth onto boil. Once the broth is boiling add couscous. It takes about five minutes to cook. Strain with a lid on top.

2. Microwave chicken”less” strips according to directions. You could also do this on the stove top, but I was hungry and wanted something quick.

Last night I made black bean and sweet potato enchiladas with mole sauce for Andrew and I. They turned out really good (despite what the pictures look like). The texture was a little mushy. Next time I would leave the black beans whole instead of putting them through the food processor. I also made baked tortilla chips with seasoning and guacamole.

Recipe:

Ingredients (Filling)

1 sweet potato (microwave for about ten minutes)

1 14 oz. can of organic vegetarian black beans

sprinkling of nutritional yeast

1 tablespoon of tapatio hot sauce

1 teaspoon of minced garlic

salt and pepper to taste

Ingredients (Mole Enchilada Sauce)

1 14 oz. of diced, peeled cooked tomatoes

1 pkg. dried enchilada sauce

1 pkg. dried mole sauce

water

1 tsp. agave syrup (optional, I put this in because I found the tomatoes to be too acidic)

Plus seven yellow corn tortillas.

1. Pre-heat oven to 375°. Scoop the sweet potato out of its skin (you could also add the skin for extra nutritional value, I’m just not sure what this would do to the texture) and put in a food processor. Pulse until smooth. Add the black beans and puree until smooth. Add spices, nutritional yeast, garlic, and hot sauce and pulse until mixed. Set aside until ready to assemble.

2. Put canned tomatoes into food processor. Puree until all chunks are smooth (there will still be some seeds and skins, don’t worry about this). Pour into a medium sauce pan with a 1 1/2 cups of water. Pour in seasoning packets and bring to a boil. Then reduce to a simmer and cook for five minutes. At this point I added the agave syrup in order to make it taste less acidic.

3. Pour enough sauce into a casserole dish to cover the bottom lightly. To assemble the enchiladas: take a tortilla (make sure they are room temperature and fresh, cold tortillas will NOT roll well and will break), add a heaping spoonful of the filling, and roll. Place each enchilada seam side down onto the sauce. Pour the rest of the sauce over the enchiladas. Then sprinkle with nutritional yeast (this acts as the cheesy part of the enchilada).

4. Put in the pre-heated oven and cook for about thirty minutes. Serve with baked tortilla chips, guacamole, and a green salad.

I used my one hundred calorie tortillas in another lunch concoction. This time I bought chicken terriyaki skewers from Scotts Valley Market. I took the chicken off one and cut it up into smaller pieces. I cut half of an avocado into cubes. I layered spinach, avocado, chicken, and shredded cheese into one tortilla. It was pretty yummy even though it ended up falling apart.

Yesterday I was limited to eggs as my protein and one tortilla left. I always have a variety of grains on hand, usually in bulk, but sometimes ready meals such as Rice-a-Roni or in this case, Zatarain’s Jambalaya mix (low sodium of course). I followed the jambalaya mix directions, using low sodium chicken broth instead of water to give it more flavor. I did not add any meat or seafood, but put eggs on top of it instead to create a jambalaya breakfast burrito. It was rather tasty.